Unexpected Joy in Japan

After Taiwan our intention had been to visit the Philippines and we even had a flight booked but we knew it was still rainy season and when we were checking the forecasts it did look pretty rubbish so we cancelled our flight and booked a new one to Japan! Japan is somewhere that I have wanted to visit for a very long time so it was exciting and very unexpected to be able to do it, especially as we only had five days to plan before leaving!

We’d booked a direct flight with Cathay Pacific and the flight originated in Hong Kong and the typhoon that we’d been affected by a few days earlier had actually hit Hong Kong the night before so our flight was delayed by 5 hours! We only found this out at the gate but they handed some food vouchers out so it wasn’t all bad, plus we figured that in all our travels we’ve been fortunate enough to never really be massively delayed so we were probably due a delayed flight! If you ever find yourselves severely delayed at Taipei airport with a food voucher in hand, our top tip would be walk to Starbucks and eat there – our voucher went further there than at the nearby ‘local’ restaurants. Another top tip is to go to duty free if you want a drink – a can of beer from duty free was about 60p as opposed to being twice the price at a restaurant.

We eventually landed into Tokyo and reached our hotel around 12.30am, it wasn’t ideal by any means as we didn’t have time to get our bearings on arrival and we had to pay a fine at our hostel for a late check in!

The next morning we got up and set about heading into Tokyo. We pretty much fell at the first hurdle! The transport system was quite overwhelming with different lines being owned by different companies, there was also mainline trains, a metro and a subway system- all having different ticket systems. When we eventually arrived at Tokyo station we almost lost the plot trying to find our way around. I’ve since read the Tokyo station has 200 exits and I can well believe that. Individual local stations are hard enough to get around with different areas for different lines but this was something else! It was really frustrating to start with and I started to panic that we’d done the wrong thing coming to Japan, but we had some food and we pulled ourselves together!

We spent 4 nights in Tokyo visiting various temples, parks and Godzilla! We visited the Metropolitan Assembly building which has a free viewpoint of the city which was stunning. We also managed to get a free tour of the assembly hall which was really interesting, the guy showing us around told us that they’d recently been debating how to reduce the crow population- we had noticed how many crows there were and how large and menacing they were so it was a relief to hear they were discussing measures on how to control them.

Tokyo also presented us the chance to catch up with our friends Wun Lee and David who had been travelling Japan for the previous three months. We arranged to meet them at a toy shop and we were greeted by the hilarious sight of them in the below hats! David mentioned that he wanted to see Godzilla head and I had a quick look on the map and there was supposedly a Godzilla statue around the corner so I led us all on a walking tour to the statue and it was very much a damp squib. It was the smallest Godzilla statue I have seen and I’m not sure I’ll be starting a new career as a tour guide any time soon!

Japan is obviously famous for its bullet trains but prices have increased recently and there was no way we could afford to splash almost £500 each on a pass, so we opted for a much more reasonable bus pass instead.

We took a bus from Tokyo to Fujikawaguchiko where we spent two nights. We arrived around lunchtime and headed straight out for a walk around Lake Kawaguchiko it was beautiful scenery and we met someone along the way who told us that in 10 minutes we’d be able to see Mount Fuji and it was stunning when we did see it! The lake setting and the sunshine made it such a beautiful walk. We walked to Oishi Park and came across a beautiful field with the most gorgeous plants and it really did give us the most beautiful pictures of Fuji. When we arrived back at the hostel they told us that we had been really lucky as Mount Fuji had been out all day, it’s very common for it to disappear behind cloud at some point but it hadn’t done at all that day.

The next day we bought tickets for a sightseeing bus which has three lines and you can hop on and off at any point, the tickets were valid for two days so we planned to do that for the next two days.

We headed to another lake and walked around and then hopped back on to visit some lava caves. The caves were really interesting as they were formed of lava so different to any other caves that we have seen. It was much cooler in Fuji to the rest of Japan, especially at night so it was back to layers. We were lucky for a second day in a row and Fuji stayed out all the day for us – Fuji was just beautiful!

The next day we were catching a nightbus and we woke up to pouring rain. Not much chance of seeing Fuji today it would seem! We’d saved one of the bus lines for today though which actually had the worst views of Fuji anyway so the rain didn’t matter too much and we set off on that route. We visited another lava cave, called the bat cave and then walked through the forest to another bus stop. The rain eventually stopped and we ended up at the Iyashi no Sato which is the recreation of a traditional village which had been destroyed by a landslide in 1966. We headed back to the hostel to grab some food and our bags and when we reached the town Fuji put in an appearance and she was gloriously covered in snow! How lucky we were to see her with and without snow! We were limited on time so couldn’t snap the best photos but we felt so blessed to be there to savour the views.

We were heading to Kyoto but we had to first head back to Tokyo before picking up the next bus. When we boarded the bus at Tokyo we were very pleasantly surprised by the overall comfiness of the bus – it even had a ‘pram’ hood for extra comfort and made frequent comfort breaks. We both slept really well – which is surprising as you all know I love a moan about some of the night buses we’ve had on this trip!

We arrived into Kyoto station around 6.30am so we left our bags in a storage locker and headed to McDonald’s for breakfast. We then headed off to a nearby temple which was pretty quiet. We then tried to take a shortcut to another temple but ended up in some school grounds! The security guard was very helpful though and even gave us our first origami crane.

We spent the day wondering round until we started to flag and needed food! A quick pit stop though and we were on our way again. We stayed a little way from the centre and headed off to our apartment. Accommodation in Japan was pretty expensive (compared to what we have been used to) so we were finding ourselves in bunkbeds and with shared bathrooms more often than not so it felt like a treat to have our own bathroom here.

Kyoto was all about the temples and they were quite beautiful but it was also the busiest place we visited. We tried walking up a street to get to a particular temple and we just gave up as it was so busy, to the point where it was almost scary!

Poor Joey came down with a cold in Kyoto so was feeling under the weather most of the time but he did save his energy for a visit to Fushimi Inarin Shrine. This is very famous as it has hundreds of Torii gates aligning the path of a hill – very beautiful and different to anything we have seen.

From Kyoto we took a local train a very short ride to Osaka, famous for its neon lights. Joey was still feeling rough so we took it very easy and basically made that our only activity! It was very fun and we have some great photos.

After Osaka we took the bus to Hiroshima, infamous as the place that the first atomic bomb was detonated. We knew it would be a hard place to visit but I don’t think either of us realised how much of an impact it would have on us.

We had two full days here so decided to split the time in two with us tackling the more challenging aspects first before having fun later!

We started off with a walk through the Peace park, visiting ground zero where the bomb detonated and several memorials. We also visited memorial hall which had a temporary exhibition featuring the memories of those who had worked at the meteorological office during the time. We watched a video of men recalling their experiences and it was probably the hardest thing I have ever sat through. One spoke about going back into Hiroshima after the bomb had exploded to try and find his sister and the town was littered with bodies. All the bodies were almost unrecognisable and he struggled to recall what his sister was wearing that day and he found it hard to keep looking. He went back to his office (I should mention that he was badly injured and could barely walk) and then came back the next day to try and find her, only by the time he reached town all of the bodies had been removed and he never found his sister. He spoke in a very moving manner about the guilt that he had felt ever since and I found it incredibly hard to watch and digest.

One of the lesser talked about things of Hiroshima is the fact that a month after the bomb a typhoon ripped through the city making the situation even worse. Weather forecasts were still banned so the people of the city had not been able to take evasive action.

We then visited the Peace Memorial museum and this was also incredibly moving. It was very, very busy, to the point that you almost couldn’t see the exhibitions but what was really interesting and poignant was how quiet everyone was as they moved through the exhibitions. The pictures and stories were again very harrowing and moved us both to tears again. The pictures told a story of complete destruction and the entire city was completely destroyed, it was truly awful to see the pain and suffering told in those photos and it both gave us a lot to think about and I wanted to immediately join the CND.

The next day we stuck to our word of doing something fun and headed off on day trip to Miyajima island, a UNESCO world heritage site. We caught the train and a ferry there and headed up the hill on a very steep hike. You can also catch a cable car but we had time and energy so we went for it. It was a very peaceful and serene walk and just what we needed after the previous day. It was worthwhile as well as the views from the top of hill were stunning. There is a famous torii gate which, when the tide is in, looks as though it is floating. The tide was out when we arrived but back in upon leaving!

That night we caught a night bus back to Tokyo and again we slept like angels! I wish every night bus could be like the Japanese night buses!

We dropped our luggage at a hotel and set off to visit the ‘cat temple’ this is the temple from which the ‘lucky kitty’ is born. Legend has it a cat was seen beckoning its owner in from a storm. The temple has thousands of lucky kitties in the grounds and it was nice to see such a unique place. We then headed to some gardens to while away our homeless day. After that we headed to a tech store and spending time in tech stores in Japan was so much fun – our favourite thing was the toilet section and deciding which one we’d like to install when we remodel our bathroom in the future – heated toilet seats are definitely the future!

The next day was our last day in Japan and we spent the morning at a Hedgehog cafe. I love hedgehogs and back in our garden at home we were regularly visited by wild ones so this was such a treat. Japan has lots of animal cafes and when I found out that included hedgehogs I had to go. You get an hour to pet them, this did feel a bit odd as in the UK you are discouraged from picking them up but I really enjoyed the experience and l found it so relaxing when one fell asleep in my hands.

We spent the afternoon wandering around revisiting a few places (including the Godzilla head) and enjoyed a game of bowling before it was time to say goodbye to Japan.

Japan was such a lovely surprise as we didn’t expect to go on this trip, we managed more or less within our budget by doing things such as sleeping in dorms and sharing bathrooms. We didn’t eat out much which also made it cheaper and we travelled by bus rather than train which again made it cheaper so I’m pleased we managed to backpack a small part of Japan on our backpackers budget!